Paul W made a good comment on my last post:
In the same way that I detest the phrase "Congress failed to... xyz" I think saying "the party" is not really a useful term because you've got the likes of Andy Kim, AOC, etc. who are ready to bring the hammer down and more in that camp now as a result of Trump and Callais. Then there is the average Dem registered voter who is far closer to AOC, in fact they are where we need them if not further, but feel like they aren't getting the representation and the action they need.
Let's break down the components of the party and move folks like Hickenlooper and the VA, NY senators into the hotseats and not just lament a problem that (for once) doesn't exist: we are ready for action, the question is can we get a caucus that represents that?
So here’s one example of a component of the party that should be praised:
House Democrats are getting ready to fight the Trump administration’s corruption, with the launch of an “End Corruption Caucus” on Wednesday.
In a press release, the caucus—which is chaired by Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, Jason Crow of Colorado, and Mike Levin of California—said it will “work to advance legislation, bring together like-minded partners, and aim to root out corruption in government, to restore the American people’s trust in their leaders.”
Ocasio-Cortez noted in a statement that the outsized influence of big money in U.S. politics causes average people to lose trust in institutions.
“It is time that we put Americans first and earnestly work to restore the faith and integrity of our lawmaking,” she said.
Similarly, Crow said plainly that consumer costs are so expensive right now as a direct result of the Trump administration’s corruption.
So, this is good, especially hearing it from Jason Crow, who represents a D+11 district. But why is there a special caucus created by Democrats in Congress to talk about and perhaps do something that the whole party should be talking/doing? Is it because the House Oversight Committee should have AOC as ranking but she was frozen out so that the late Gerry Connolly, who was suffering from cancer, could get the job and die in office? (And then Jasmine Crockett was frozen out in favor of Robert Garcia.) Are we creating a shadow House Oversight Committee because the existing one isn’t getting their message out?
I think this is relevant to Paul’s comment. Since the readership of this blog is, from what I can tell, interested in reforming the Democratic Party, we should be precise about naming the parts of the Party that we think need reform, and not just use “The Democrats” as a catch-all.
But we should also realize that one of the issues that Democrats have is that we’ve got all these fragmented groups in the Party who are constantly making little messaging efforts that don’t gain a lot of steam. In other words, there are all these little parts of the party, so many that it’s hard to keep track of all of them, and they dilute our message.
